Three types of Reading Comprehension Passages

The Reading Comprehension section has been the bte noire of CAT candidates for
long now. Simply because the length of the passage has varied every year, the type of
questions ased has also varied and there is no tutorial!technique that one can use to
prepare for the various types of passages. All one can do is simply practice as many
RCs as possible and hope that on the "#day some of this practice might come handy.
$ith the CAT e%am going online the RC section underwent significant changes. The first
things is that the passages have become shorter, throwing all simming techniques out
of the window. &t now maes sense to read the complete passage in detail. The RC
passages can be categori'ed broadly under three categories(
Analytical: The analytical passages generally deal with the analysis of
ideas!issues!events and are the difficult in terms of the questions that follow. )ost of the
questions are implicit in nature, *what would the author do in a particular situation+, *what
is the author implying when he says this..+ etc., Additionally the passages can be about
any issue!topic!idea that is not from one+s area of interest or is one is not comfortable
with.
Analytical passages would require a significant understanding of the ideas that the
author had in mind while writing the piece. This is required for questions lie -appropriate
title for the passage- or -the author would have written this passage for a .ournal!a
newspaper etc....-
A good way to do this is the *RC coordinate system+. $hen you read the passage, write
down on your scratch sheet the main ideas!idea changes that you observe over the
course of your reading along with the coordinates/ here the first coordinate represents
the paragraph number and the second coordinate is for the line number. 0or e%ample(
12, 3, # -need for religion in human society-. This means that paragraph 2 line 3, tals
of!introduces!elaborates on the need for religion in human society.
4y the time you are done reading the passage, you would have an -idea map- that would
help you figure out the author+s thought process as well as the ind of questions that can
be ased from the passage. The questions that can be ased here will be about the tone
and style of the passage, the purpose, author-s bacground and his behaviour, etc. Also
if you can identify the central idea of each paragraph, it would help you later when you
are looing for answers to implicit questions and also to assign a central theme to the
entire passage. & have observed that assigning a central idea to each paragraph is
easier as compared to figuring out the central theme of the passage. 4ut once you have
an idea map and a central idea for each paragraph your tas becomes that much easier.
Another important thing to note is that analytical passages usually have an -open ended-
-style 5 they analyse the central idea from all angles and perspectives. To prepare for
such passages it would help if you read boos!articles!blogs that deal with
sub.ects!areas outside your comfort 'one. Reading editorials, reading news!op#eds that
deal with varied sub.ects will give you good e%posure to various ideas and would mae
sure that during the actual e%am you are able to assimilate ideas easily and answer
questions quicly.
6ou can also form groups of 2#7 people and form idea maps for articles that you read
and then compare your idea maps. This would be a good e%ercise in passage analysis
and would also eep you motivated. )ae sure that you read short articles, where
passages are 788#988 words in length.
:
Descriptive: "escriptive passages generally describe an event!a person!a place, etc.
The difference here is that these passages contain a lot of factual descriptions and in
some cases some opinions!.udgments but absolutely no inferences. $ith descriptive
passages the strategy is only slightly different. 0iguring out the main purpose of the
passage is easier here. Also the description of particular instances can be easily figured
out with a quic reading of the passage. ;owever the questions might be tricy at times
asing you to draw inferences based on the author-s description. Again, reading all inds
of sports articles would help 1description of matches, opinions based in that and some
things left for the readers- inference,.
Data Driven: &n the case of a data driven passages, the best way forward is to loo for
specific data. Such passages have a lot of numbers!percentages!fractions thrown
around along with the author+s opinions on them. Read the questions first to have an
e%act idea of what e%actly you are looing for/ otherwise it is very easy to get lost under
heaps of data. )ost of the questions in the case of descriptive and data driven passages
will be e%plicit questions that would deal with main idea, correct!incorrect description,
facts, vocabulary based questions, writing structure and opinions of the author. These
questions are relatively easy to answer provided one nows where to loo for the
answers.
To conclude, Reading Comprehension is a lot lie the data interpretation section # you
have strategies but there are no fi%ed and limited concepts as such. To fine#tune your
strategy, it is important that you do rigorous practice. "o not overdo the RCs if you are
not scoring well. &nstead, rewor your strategies, see if you are analysing the passage
correctly and loo where you are going wrong. <ost test analysis is very important to for
improving your performance in the RC section.
Reading Comprehension Tips for CAT
:, Broaden your knowledge: $hat section of the newspaper do you turn to while
reading a newspaper= &s it the sports section, the editorials, the celebrity column or
some other section= & go with the sports section first. $hy= & lie to read news and
reports about the sports events. Similarly, the section that you lie to read the most if the
one you are most comfortable with. "o you ever get bored reading that section or do you
ever have difficulty understanding what+s written in that section= The answer, of course,
is no. Reading essays on topics which you understand and now about is very easy as
compared to reading on alien topics. ;ence, it is very important to develop a broad
bacground of nowledge in various fields. >ssays from any field can come in RC.
&mprove your nowledge base by reading boos, newspapers, maga'ines, articles and
periodicals regularly. Start taing interest in what is happening around the world. This
would not only help you develop your reading sills but also help you during your ?roup
"iscussion and <ersonal &nterview stage. Read from a broad range of topics.
@, Understand the structure of Paragraphs: <aragraphs used in Reading
Comprehension passages in CAT are taen material written by good writers. Their
paragraphs will mostly have a proper beginning, middle part and an end section.
2, Choose your Passages Carefully: Anless the CAT paper is very easy, you are not
required to solve each and every question. Accuracy holds the ey in Reading
Comprehension as well as Berbal Ability as a whole. 0inish the easy passages first
instead of wasting time on tough passages.
;ow do & now if a passage is easy= Ceep two things in mind(
a, &s the topic of the passage familiar=
b, Are the question twisted=
@
Solve passages having direct questions first. &t+s better if the passage is on a sub.ect
which you now about.
7, Avoid ong Passages with few !uestions( This will save time and you can
concentrate on smaller passages with more questions. ;owever, remember that it is
more liely that long passages with fewer questions would be easier and may contain
direct questions. &f you have an option, go for passages with more questions.
9, "ocus on Comprehension not speed: Reading speed is a ey factor but not the
most important. Comprehend the passage fast and fully.
3, #ote the main points of the passage on paper: This will prevent you from having to
go bac to the passage!
Phases of earning
Phase $: &f you are new to RCs understanding the passage is more important than
speed or solving questions. "ivide the passage para by para. After reading each
paragraph, write a short summary to remember what you read. 0inally loo into the
questions, you will find that the lines you wrote capture most of the answers. <ractice
until find yourself at <hase @.
Phase %: ;ere you no longer need to a summary, .ust underline, what you feel is
important in each paragraph, or write down some ey words at the side of the main para
which gives the essence of the entire paragraph. &f you find difficult words convert the
sentence into the language you are comfortable with, and infer its meaning.
Phase &: 6ou now can speedily scan through the entire passage, writing a few ey
words, to locate the answers in the passage. 0or answering questions on the tone of the
passage or views about the author the ey words will give good clues.
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